


Don't Deny the Darkness Dearie!

by Dekujin



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst and Fluff and Smut, Basically Belle and Rumple both get consensually wrecked by Dark One goop., Belle/Rumplestiltskin | Mr. Gold in the Dark Castle, F/M, Goop!Rumple, Masturbation, Non Traditional TLK, Oral Sex, Original Dark One Lore, Porn With Plot, Rumple will not turn human, Slime, The Dark One (Once Upon a Time), Threesome - F/M/M, sort of??
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-30
Updated: 2019-06-30
Packaged: 2020-05-31 02:30:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,732
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19416643
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dekujin/pseuds/Dekujin
Summary: A long time ago true love had severed a great evil from its powerful state into lesser means. In the wake it left behind a story of hosts, a magical dagger, and a curse that would gain each wielder the infamy of 'Dark One'.The latest and longest lasting Dark One-Rumplestiltskin, finds himself weak after spending a great deal of magic upon his dark and terrible curse to reunite with his son. Leaving his castle on a cold winters night in the care of his maid he ventures to the Dark One’s vault to regain his strength. However, nothing goes as planned with the imp forced to face his true feelings for the lovely Belle, she her feelings for her master, and both of them the desires of something much, far, darker...





	Don't Deny the Darkness Dearie!

**Author's Note:**

> Quite a few years back I wrote a story some might remember as 'Don't Deny the Darkness' and while I liked what I had wrote I never finished it and in time didn't care for what exactly I had done. I've always loved the concept still, especially since there were never many other fics focusing on the Dark Vault and its goopy qualities when it had first been shown in season three.
> 
> It's been some time since then, the series is over, and I absolutely hate what they'd done with the Dark One lore so all of that after season three is absolutely ignored (on top of not liking anything canon beyond 3A). I might also continue this idea more so after the original three to four chapters of content I originally imagined, depending. I've gone back to this story as an also much needed break as currently I am incapable of writing my main fic Real Inside from a horrible mental block.
> 
> That said I hope people can enjoy this newer vision to the idea I once had as there is more plot to this than the original. Still a lot of goopy fun though!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sorry that this is just a back lore intense heavy prologue chapter from the stand point of Rumple's curse/darkness/what exactly is it?? I wanted to use this fic to explore in my opinion a cooler idea for the Dark One's origins. Plus this helps make more of the motivations in the story later a lot more understandable since the other chapters will only be from Belle and Rumple's POV's. Please let me know what you think!

————— 

In its entire existence all it knew was simply what it was.

Darkness.

It knew that and yet didn’t-existed and yet ‘lived’ without true thought to anything in mere mortal terms. Altogether the power was a wriggling mass that was tangible, and at the same time formless with no ability to make choices that defied its nature. In far more ancient ages it had been a force to be reckoned with instead of being some shell of its former self. Back then most of the races, people, creatures, and beings with languages and tongues had referred to it as a ‘god’, some others a ‘deity’, many more ‘devil’, 'evil', or ‘the darkness’ itself. Regardless of what it truly was, for that was one of the few things even itself didn’t quite understand, all things with a soul feared it to the depths of their hearts, seeing it an endless abyss that would one day come for them all.

They weren’t wrong in that fear-it was true. At first it wanted nothing more than complete and utter destruction of everything. By ending life itself it was sure it had hoped to fill the hollow ache inside that it alone with all its magic could not satisfy.

For the longest span of time in those dark ages it did what it wished, unknowing nothing it did could fill its void. No army, magic, or force through out the lands it had dwelled in had found a way to bring it to an end in those glorious days either. Entire kingdoms had fallen before its might while whole generations were wiped out with a simple flick of its power. Nothing and no one imposed on it a feeling of sliver of fear or notes of desperation, not that something like it could ever perceive such things at the time. Back then there'd been none of these flippant... ' _Feelings’_ to deal with like it did much later down the line.

However, like all things, that reign came to an end one fateful day by a selfless pure act.

That a sacrifice born from two people had somehow been enough to end the centuries of evil imposed on the world itself.

Well, perhaps not end it-more so bind it into far lesser means.

The memories of what exactly happened were lost to the darkness still to this day in its final form, but regardless the damage had been done with no means to reverse it. After the event took place the darkness found to it had survived if at a terrible and wonderful cost. If there were any gods they must have been humoring it by allowing it to continue to be apart of the world this way, bound to a means that then required two specific things least it be destroyed.

First, it needed a living host that chose to take its power on and then secondly, to its utter loathing… The only piece to the puzzle of its undoing it had.

A disgusting curved dagger-the one from the sacrifice that held complete control for darkness, magic, and host.

Upon a cruel twist of irony the first host was the dagger's original owner-the very same woman who’d it later learned had lost her true love-the rarest love of all for mortals, in the ‘sacrifice’. Neither she nor the man who had stood against it with all their sorcery and might had known the price for what they did to bring 'peace' to the world. It recalled through her eyes how the man died in her arms while it had begun to wither-both sets of 'blood' staining her hands which had then helped tethered it to her and that wretched dagger. While her heart had been pure and noble in original intent, hoping to defeat it in a battle that ended them all, it had felt that desire change upon seeing her true love cold and dead on the ground and it still alive. Enough doubt in her heart had festered as in rage when she cursed being allowed to live…

To this day the darkness recalled her screams as the thing that robbed her of her love became a part of her... Not that it had wished for that twist either.

Still, a bound body that meant it continued to exist was far better than the alternative of not existing at all.

To its luck the next transition after that came even easier in the form of a rich nobleman who'd managed to find out about the dagger's quirk very quickly as the woman had went on a raid of destruction. With a few mercenaries and then a quick stab to the heart with the dagger the darkness had leapt from one thrumming body that fell down empty in relief into the next volatile thriving one. From there on went this new cycle of killing, jumping to a new host, and feeding into each their own darkness for a period before it would always began new. It's time in this state quickly had the darkness coming to understand everything about its new self in ways it never could have prior being the sheer mighty force that swept over valleys and continents to burn at all it touched.

In this ‘living’ form it now understood what each human or being that it became one with was as well. Inside their minds, souls, and hearts it cultivated the knowledge to the actual weight of 'fear', the driving impulse of 'desire', and the icy clutch of 'hatred' that tasted sweeter than honey… Though it quite enjoyed the gluttony all living beings shared-its current host had given it a terrible sweet tooth. From there it studied further the feeling of remorse, regret, sorrow, despair as everything that once had been nothing to it became, well, _everything_. Most of that time there were still emotions and feelings it couldn't understand even blending in with mortal minds. While it could understand the 'joy' in ripping out a beating heart and crushing it to dust it couldn't understand the 'delight' in watching a beautiful sunset unless it was over a battle field drenched in so much gore that the soil beneath its feet was murky crimson puddles.

In its new state it found though that it liked experiencing itself being merged to a vessel full of senses that it didn't have before. With a ‘brain’ a ‘heart’ and a ‘mind’ to inhabit it made the experience completely different than the limited, thoughtless, bland force it had once pertained too. It was so delighted by it all that a part of it was almost thankful for the sacrifice that brought it to this low state. How could it have ever hoped to describe to its former self the satisfaction at feeling warm blood running down fingers, tasting hopeless tears, smelling the scent death, or hearing the cries of broken people and war ripping through the lands? 

Perhaps strangest of all was that every time was how the dark magic aided not just in making its hosts 'monsters' mentally but physically too. It was the same change-golden-green scales, strange reptilian eyes, dark claws, terrible sharp teeth… Was this what something as incomprehensible as evil was supposed to look like? It couldn’t recall its previous form before the damned blade, but was this really what creatures feared to be seen as or to see looking back at them in the dark? The appearance meant little as it couldn’t understand beauty in ways mortals did, though it quiet liked when things looked upon each host with fear.

Much more amusing was how each host had their own different reactions upon seeing what they once were be consumed in their quest for power. Some took to their new flesh and magic with the upmost glee, some didn't care a wink, and others used glamors to hide themselves though their darkness always seeped out one way or another. Some beings still took to the hosts in their reviled ‘disgusting’ flesh, seeking carnal delights due to danger or with hopes to use the hosts to their advantage with their own means of emotional manipulation. Time and time again most of those who sought relations with them soon fled in terror least were found dead by the beast of the person they once knew.

Such things took a toll though, far too many of its hosts couldn’t bare such things or the emotional pain. Time and time again it growled in anger as it was forced to stand by as they threw their own lives away by committing planned suicide by passing the dagger along themselves. How dare they waste such a gift! All the magic and might! In time-time longer than mortals had, the darkness began to wonder further about itself when this happened. Was being apart of it something so miserable when they could have whatever they wanted and do whatever they wanted? Alas, it felt no empathy for those that abandoned it. Instead it looked eagerly to the next desperate soul who'd claimed it and would soon be lost in the clutch of its fathomless might, releasing their own brand of dark magic upon the world.

Every act the hosts committed-every death, wound, curse, and spell... It was divine… It was bliss! It was-it was...

Still not enough.

No, it wasn’t! Just like before it was never enough!

For no matter what it did, no matter what horrors it committed, no matter how fused it and its host became… The hollow emptiness it had long ago remained within.

No change of living host made that upsetting point any better, and along with being trapped to that blasted blade that could control them both the darkness started to believe that it would never find just whatever it was it was looking for. Despite the centuries like this it still didn't know what it was looking for in the first place! Something that made it all the more frustrating! With every new murder and every new sin-it-it didn't seem to satisfy it like it once did! **_How!_** How could that be when violence, cruelty, and malice was the very essence of its nature? So then what could it be it was looking for if all that brought it 'pleasure' meant nothing? What did the sacrifice that ensnared it made it think that this path would somehow head in the right direction to satisfy its eternal longing? How did it not know these things when it was all at once limitless and infinite?

Days, months, years flew on as it puzzled these things over in the back of each cursed mind. As it did in just the flicker of decades this had begun stories and legends were born of its hosts-‘The Dark One' as people liked to call each of them. The blade itself too passed, and passed, and passed with new names embedded into it and sometimes falling from its hosts hands into its enemies.... Something it hated down to its core. All the while this continued no new spark of a future without this increasing agony or emptiness seemed to be possible at all for either host nor itself.

Then on the edge of a tiny worthless village no different from the rest  was a brilliant glimmer.

In its last host before its current one the darkness had found itself in another man who far too soon came to despise what he'd become. The man, Zoso, had swiftly in his time as a Dark One also become a slave to an absolute imbecile of a Duke. Nothing made the darkness more upset-to be brought so low by such filth! It could raise countries and continents but here it was being forced to make these people's own children to fight in a war that once would have sent it laughing into hysterics as such small bodies were torn apart like weeds by brutish ogres. Expectedly Zoso had prepared a plan to pass the blade and curse, leaving the darkness scowling and grumbling at this never changing game that was growing to be boring as it was exhausting. Then when the night came for Zoso to act as the man had stumbled across a most desperate soul…

It was laughable at first, perhaps the saddest excuse of a host yet-the man was a mere meek spinner crippled by his own hand!

By that point the darkness had merged with so many different kinds of people-wealthy nobles, the absolute poor, great and mighty warriors, to the weak and shamed, so it expected nothing different. With some taunting the timid man who could barely walk managed to pull forth a scrap of courage to plunge the blade in Zoso’s chest. Yet, as the act was committed the light in the humble man scorched at it for a brief moment. Such light-how odd, this was no man who should be becoming something as evil as ‘The Dark One’. Just like all the rest though even a good man like him fell as there was no escape from the curse that was enacted for either of them.

However, the moment the blade was pulled from the dying flesh with the spinner’s name upon it-the darkness surging in through his veins, the darkness felt something it hadn't before.

A very, very, unsettling sensation.

Finality.

Unexpectedly, with a means beyond itself, the darkness knew that somehow this man was meant to be its host for for the rest of its days.

The gleam of the name on the blade that it saw then with his eyes...

Rumple... Stilt... Skin...

Rumplestiltskin-ah! The sorcerer spinner… The dealmaker… The dark imp... It and he!

**_R-R-R-Rumplestiltskin!_ **

What an unusual name! What a delicious interesting sound! It had never been with anyone with such a mouthful of a horrendous moniker, but what a ring to it!

_ 'Rumplestiltskin-The Dark One!' _

Like the other hosts the man's entire history, memories, and emotions soon became part of the darkness’s very being. Flashes of a miserable childhood, of no mother, a father who abandoned him-Peter Pan, of two Spinsters, spinning, later of a wife, a note to go to war, a seer, a hammer, a walking stick, a miserable wife, a beautiful child, spinning, a pirate's ship, a hobble of a home for two, happy days with his child, many a night with an empty stomach, spinning, sneers and glares, more spinning, cruelty of fellow villagers, even more love for this boy, spinning day in and day out, the return of war... Then closer to the present were more familiar subjects, that foolish duke, stolen children, of Zoso as a beggar, then a kris dagger.

Such tragedy of a life should have more than enjoyable, but both human and darkness were in a daze as the transformation completed itself. In the blink of an eye tan spinner’s skin was replaced with golden scales, his hair a wild mess, eyes became lizard like, and teeth blackened in the low morning light of a sky burning with his people’s blood. Suddenly, heady with its power it, Rumplestiltskin and it were at the edge of that same piss poor village where the previous soldiers who'd tormented him fed their blade a delicious portion of blood and iron. Of course it’d experienced rage, and hate, and longing to reclaim pride similarly enough the man's thrill and fear should have been boring. With the spinner, _oh its spinner_ , everything instead felt wonderfully fun again! Everything felt between them-it was new and exciting beyond reason in that scrawny small frame!

It dreamt of them rendering the world asunder in that instance of bodies crumpled on the ground and war in the air.

That was until the man’s child came into the mix.

A few Dark One’s prior to Rumplestiltskin had once had their own youth and family members. Even fewer of those had tried to pull its hosts out of the darkness’s clutch to which all had failed. None, and it meant none, however, had felt such love or a desire to protect their youth like Rumplestiltskin did for his sole offspring. Such feelings were intense and bright… The darkness found itself conflicted in how to react at this core opposing ideal that then used its magic. The spinner was just a man in the end which made it easier-one who in deep dark crevices of his mind craved to harm those who’d deeply wronged him and his kin. He'd been downtrodden so long that the darkness was able to power what malice he happened to have to get what they both wanted. Yet, that same night the children were all brought home from the battlefield where every ogre has been beautifully eviscerated the village had sung Rumplestiltskin's praise!

What a strange thing to experience-the satisfaction of blood pathed destruction and the revelry of affection! While it had also wanted to protect the children itself out of spite from the duke even after it still found it sought to help protect them and Baelfire. Like the darkness expected though the village inevitably turned on Baelfire and his father, fearing the man turned 'monster, 'demon, and 'imp' in their eyes. Rumplestiltskin's fear continued to fester worse, causing it more confusion as it had sought to alleviate that fear in both him and his child though it knew now that back then it couldn't have... It only made things worse.

The bigger question was why? Why had it started to care about such pathetic creatures? Why had it to care for a child when it had been in hosts long ago that had destroyed villages and innocents without a blink?

That continued to baffle it to this day-what made Baelfire any different than the other lives it had helped be ripped from this world? It didn't know, but it found as the days progressed, going slower than normal, it pointed its preferred host in certain directions to ensure the boy's comfort alongside Rumplestiltskin's own dark desires. A man with valuables to trade that faltered on a deal then meant eternal sleep for him and a knife that they hoped Baelfire would like. Wandering thieves leering at the local village women became pincushions strewn apart on forest paths while their gold rested in the pots of the passing beggars. Then a man who had hurt Rumplestiltskin's boy with a cart was turned into a snail before being crushed as a warning towards everyone else on the consequences of hurting _their_ child... Though it upset them both when Bae had ignored their desires to heal him his magic after.

Whatever this bond the darkness had formed with Rumplestiltskin-unexplainable as it was, it grew stranger and deeper with each day. The line separating them harder to distinguish on both sides.

To its horror it found it didn't care!  It didn't care what was becoming of it or how it was softening in some ways as it grew more fierce for its host than none before him! Being in Rumplestiltskin felt right in ways it could never make mortals understand just like it couldn’t explain the delight in snapping bones or the ecstasy in turning a deal upon the head of a contractee! The light that burned within the man hadn’t been entirely engulfed was the most troubling thing of all. That same light scorched the darkness, keeping it at bay, and of all things to feel it enjoyed burning in the warmth of this man it was bound to, suffering with the upmost pleasure. Together with Rumplestiltskin it was sure that they were to become the greatest force to ever scourge the lands, and with their power would ensure Baelfire and his children, and his children's children the happiest lives.

There in those fleeting perfect days though the human half found itself longing for something else. While Rumplestiltskin felt it seemingly impossible the man began to desire for more love than just that of his offspring which infected the darkness lurking in the back of his thoughts. All the magic in the world couldn't make a bed less emptier than his. Rumplestiltskin’s light wouldn’t allow them to force anyone into it and the darkness later realized it hadn't wanted that either. In silence then Rumplestiltskin desired to share his life with another only to be tormented every time he looked at himself in a mirror, repulsed at his own being long before being the Dark One to which his new inhuman qualities made it worse. Perhaps the man was right that such a thing couldn't be given, especially to him, for no other Dark One in all its days had ever been loved. The darkness didn't know how to make such fears vanish either, for it perpetuated them as it told him that love wasn't necessary-love was a weakness as the sacrifice had surely shown it thus.

All that mattered was that they protected Baelfire which at the time was enough for them both.

A plan that shattered when the boy had come up with a means of his father ridding him of his 'curse'.

It made the darkness's magic boil, thinking of how the boy had talked with a fucking fairy of all things, something that Rumplestiltskin hadn’t been keen on either to its secret delight. Annoying insufferable dusty good for nothing gnats! The thorn had encouraged the boy’s desires to ‘free’ his father after he'd made the man promise to do whatever it took to break the curse. Why-why couldn't Baelfire see that they were doing what was best for him! What could a magic bean ensure that they could not with gold they spun and the powers they passed beyond anything anyone could fight against! Then the boy-even now in Rumplestiltskin it wriggled in disgust, had tried dragging his father out into the woods to use a magic bean to take them to a horrible wretched land without magic.

No-no-no! It hadn't wanted to go! It hadn't wanted to die in a land that claimed to be free of magic! Without magic it would not exist! Already it was so much less of itself with how much magic it'd lost from the sacrifice! Even if it didn't die it was likely it would slumber-lost to the void that consisted of it and be trapped alone deep within the spinner where he would not be able to reach it. In time it didn't doubt it would find a way to escape, but that meant the likelihood loosing Rumplestiltskin… Loosing him... No...

**_No._ **It would not allow that either.

In a moment of complete agreement without any of its influence Rumplestiltskin had been just afraid. The man's fear was understandable though the boy hadn't known that part of his father's tragic story. The spinner feared the portal that was so much like the one his own father and him had tried to use to start a ‘new life’ that had ended up with Rumplestiltskin's abandonment. Looking at it Rumplestiltskin saw the same ending playing out while Baelfire had tossed it, so hopeful for a means to save his father. Even then it took so much convincing for the darkness’s host to not fall through after-to not let them lose this life they had gained. With a firm grip on the dagger linking them Rumplestiltskin had lost his bravery and courage to hold onto his boy who then fell into the portal ripping at the earth. For a moment the darkness felt victorious, having kept its favorite body and soul bound to it.

Then when the wind died down and as it looked to the hollowed earth where Baelfire was no longer... It realized it had lost more than it knew it ever could.

Baelfire was gone and Rumplestiltskin's heart-his happiness, crumbled to dust.

Happiness… Once upon a time the darkness hadn't known what that was, not true happiness. Now with the boy gone it remembered the fleeting moments far too late. Like the nights with man and darkness spinning at a wheel with their son sleeping peacefully nearby. That time they'd tasted good exotic food neither spinner nor Baelfire had never had before, letting them both see the spark of joy in the boy's eyes he'd tried to hide. The small smiles when the child felt his father was almost the same as he'd once been, regardless of the scales and awful teeth. Then there'd been the nights they'd caught Baelfire returning from sneaking out to meet Moraine-a good girl they'd saved from the war. The pleasure in knowing that their son wasn't feared by all was worth it despite many a cold shoulder thrown at them for an overprotectiveness that had gone too far.

While human part of the Dark One laid there crying, mourning, and screaming at the heavens in that pit the darkness in his veins screamed too. This time beyond any call of evil besides for Rumplestiltskin to tear the blue fairy apart.

A way… A way! There had to be a way-a way to remain within its desired host and get the boy back! There had to be a way to get everything they wanted together! It was darkness-it was powerful, and its host may have been a mere spinner but even before he'd been cunning, sharp-he was smart. Together… Yes! Yes! Despite the raging loss immediately Rumplestiltskin and it began right away on working on a means to get to a land without magic. Without any forewarning the time of existing solely to harm, maim, and torture was cast aside as the darkness helped in every way it could to for Rumplestiltskin to gain a path back to Baelfire. At the back of Rumplestiltskin’s mind it still feared this unknown land and what it would do to them if they were to go-hah.. Fear-hah! It feared! Against thousands of years it existed here it feared, and felt, and longed for something that should have meant nothing to it at all!

Baelfire… Rumplestiltskin… They meant something to it-meant something so... So much...

It could never imagine... That happiness could bring so much pain. 

With that the tides turned-the tables flipped, for it was not Rumplestiltskin who was the only one cursed anymore.

Instead he'd become a ‘ _curse_ ’ too.

A curse of humanity, of goodness, and love that the darkness so wanted to feel as its very own! It wanted to be him in every capacity-to be something more than wicked intent itself! Even then it knew it was absolutely futile, for while it longed for the same things Rumplestiltskin did it also still longed to destroy, kill, and hurt which was something no creature could ever care for. The struggle for both host and darkness continued as they fused more and more, changing from wild fledgling Dark One into something never seen before, not by fairy or deity. Upon agreeing to promise off all love Rumplestiltskin strived with all his strength to regain what they'd lost be it by means of evil or good, it didn't matter. He'd do it all-tear the world apart, even face that frightening land with the possibility of his magic lost to an eternal sleep.

From there their story continued as the once poor spinner over the course of three hundred years became the most powerful sorcerer to ever exist. Every day passed with the Dark One focused on nothing but schemes, plans, and deals amongst stolen foresight for his boy while building up a collection of powerful items to prevent anyone from ever threatening his magic ever again. Kingdoms fell into place between their claws while wars waged from the smallest domino effect in favor the of their future envisioned in mere glimpses of a larger puzzle. Eventually with the aid of an old magic Rumplestiltskin's desperation found them a viable path-a dark curse to end all curses which would give them what they wanted. It was possible! A means to a land without magic alongside a means to bringing magic to it as well!

Yet, none could have suspected the hand of fate that would soon alter the course of the entire enchanted forest.

Not of a deal with a tiny seaside kingdom, the imp acquiring a beautiful princess as his maid, or of a true love that would bring light to the darkest of places.

A change that began for that brave beauty and her dark beast on a miserably, cold, winter's night...


End file.
